Why Captured German Soldiers Were Shot HH

During the Second World War, soldiers often had to make a split-second decision to carry on fighting and go out in a blaze of glory or risk it all, or they just had to simply put their hands up, surrender, and give themselves over to their enemy. Many of these soldiers expected to be treated roughly in the hands of their enemies.

 For example, Allied troops who found themselves inside Japanese captivity often faced starvation, barbaric beatings, and horrific execution. But in Europe, despite the Allies appearing to be the champions of fairness in the face of brutality, the Allies often shot captured German troops on the battlefield rather than taking them as prisoners of war.

 This could happen during periods of intense and chaotic combat and fighting. But executing or shooting an enemy soldier who had genuinely surrendered was actually unlawful and against the laws of war and therefore was a war crime. German prisoners were taken in enormous numbers, especially at the end of the conflict.

 But the battlefield executions did sadly occur. So why was this? Now on the battlefield, the distinction between a defeated and a surrendering soldier was sometimes very difficult to work out quickly. A soldier becoming unable or willing to continue fighting didn’t automatically mean everyone around him understood that he had surrendered.

 Battles were of course chaotic. Smoke, darkness, artillery fire, immense noise, confusion, and fear could make intentions very difficult to interpret. A German soldier emerging from a position might have been trying to surrender, retreat, reposition himself, or continue fighting. Once the soldier clearly surrendered, they were supposed to be protected rather than deliberately killed.

 But one particularly dangerous moment was immediately after an enemy position had been stormed. Let’s imagine an Allied infantry platoon attacking a German machine gun position. Several Allied soldiers had just been killed. The surviving Germans suddenly throw down their weapons as Allied troops enter the trench.

 Legally, their surrender should be accepted. But in reality, anger, adrenaline, and fear sometimes resulted in surrendered soldiers being shot. This occurred in numerous armies during the war. It was particularly associated with extremely close-range fighting when there was a choice to be made. It was either kill the enemy before he kills you, or this man is now my prisoner.

 And that was a very important split-second decision. But taking a German soldier prisoner was also at times a logistical nightmare for the Allies. There may at times be no one available to guard prisoners. It was a very practical problem. Someone had to search them, disarm them, guard them, and then escort the captives towards the rear to be processed and then dealt with.

 Let’s take D-Day for example. The allies who landed on Normandy beaches were tasked with one thing. Get off the beach as quickly as possible and establish a position so further troops and supplies could land on the beach. The fighting was rapid and quick, and there was absolutely no time to take prisoners, so many Germans were just gunned down.

 It was imperative that these enemies were dealt with rapidly and quickly. The lawful solution would have been to secure the position and the prisoners and then evacuate them, but there was literally nowhere for these enemy troops to go except back into the sea. D-Day also created particularly dangerous circumstances because the Allies were under enormous pressure to break through the German lines.

 Small groups of enemies became isolated, officers were killed, communications broke down, and German strong points continued firing until Allied soldiers were extremely close. Canadian soldiers also had particular reason to be angry. After Voffen SS troops of the 12th SS Panza division Hitler Yugand massacred Canadian prisoners during the fighting around Normandy retaliatory killings obviously then also took place also numbers of captives was an issue.

 You couldn’t just give one soldier armed with a rifle a group of 20 captured Germans to guard and take to the rear. They could easily overpower the guard and then get back to the fighting. Some battlefield testimony does indicate that prisoners were sometimes killed and a lack of guards does sometimes explain these incidents.

There was also a fear that the German troops might resume fighting and might join the fight again, taking more lives of allied soldiers. All soldiers were suspicious too of surrender attempts. There were incidents during the war in which enemies used deceptive surrender tactics, concealed weapons, or resumed fighting after appearing to surrender.

Even relatively isolated incidents circulated amongst troops and this led to deadly consequences. A soldier approaching with raised hands might encounter men who were unwilling to risk waiting long enough to find out whether surrender was genuine or not. This became very dangerous in close combat when decisions had to be made in fractions of seconds.

There was also one type of German soldier who was particularly targeted for shooting after capture. Members of the Vauffan SS encountered particular hostility from Allied troops. The Vaughan SS became associated with atrocities and massacres, including the murder of prisoners and civilians. After Allied soldiers learned that comrades had been killed after surrendering, retaliation could follow.

One example was in the fighting during the battle of the Bulge in the Arden following the Malmi massacre when Vofen SS troops murdered and massacred American prisoners of war by machine guning them down in a field. Stories of the massacre then spread amongst the American units. There were subsequently incidents in which German prisoners were just killed by Americans. men.

 The best example of this was the Chanel massacre which took place just weeks after Mali when German troops were shot by American soldiers. But that doesn’t mean that there was a general allied policy of executing Vofen SS men. However, some veterans later stated that there was more of a culture following malady in which the Americans didn’t take SS prisoners.

 One aspect of combat anywhere during the Second World War was that soldiers often wanted vengeance and revenge quickly. A unit might discover murdered prisoners, shot civilians, and then encounter enemies shortly after. The temptation for revenge would be enormous. Soldiers were human beings after all, and the Eastern Front particularly produced extreme examples because the conflict between the Nazis and the Soviets became a war of annihilation involving starvation, mass murder, reprisal, and enormous civilian casualties.

German treatment of Soviet prisoners was catastrophic. Millions of Red Army PS died in German captivity. As the Red Army went westwards, Soviet soldiers encountered destroyed communities, mass crazes, and evidence of German atrocities. In some circumstances, captured German troops were killed because of this out of revenge rather than being sent to captivity.

 But millions of Germans were taken prisoner, so execution wasn’t inevitable after surrender. Also, certain types of soldier did attract hostility because they were considered particularly dangerous. Snipers were hated because of the personal nature of their killing. One of these might have taken out several members of a unit before finally being surrounded and dealt with.

 Machine gunners were also targeted. An infantry company might lose dozens of men attempting to eliminate a single machine gun position. If the surviving gun crew surrendered only when ammunition ran out or when Allied soldiers reached their position, the attackers might be furious and therefore they could turn their weapons on their enemies.

As mentioned though, some units did develop more informal no prisoner attitudes, especially in reaction to the atrocities committed by their enemies. Official policy and battlefield culture were clearly different things. Commanders might request prisoners to be taken formally, but soldiers developed informal understandings that certain types of their enemy would not be taken alive.

 In the east, things were particularly bad for German captives. Hitler’s commisar order had allowed German troops to execute scores of Soviet captured prisoners and around 3 million died in German captivity. On the other hand, when the Soviet forces advanced into Germany and German occupied lands, they came across soldiers who did surrender.

 The Soviet men had their own families massacred, their towns decimated, and their friends also killed. And they often took no prisoners at all because of this. But not all German soldiers who surrendered were shot. By the end of World War II, millions of German military personnel were inside Allied captivity.

 During the final months of the war, huge formations all surrendered and entire armies by May 1945 were based into Allied custody. The experience of an individual soldier depended on where, when, and to whom they surrendered to. A Vermax soldier surrendering to the Americans might be searched, disarmed, and taken to a prison of war enclosure, but of an SS machine gunner surrendering seconds after inflicting heavy casualties might face a bit more danger.

 Ultimately, battlefield killings of captured German troops came from a combination of fear, rage, revenge, confusion, combat exhaustion, logistical problems, hatred of particular enemy formations, and the brutal nature of war produced by the long nature of it. But shooting an enemy who had surrendered was a war crime.

 The disturbing reality of World War II, though, was that fractions of seconds counted and that troops found themselves often too quick on the trigger, as they felt their enemies would do the same and bring their lives to an end. Thanks for watching. If you did find this video interesting, maybe click subscribe.

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